Ladies and gentlemen, the box is FULLY recovered and using the new Spansion nand
The problem is that the vu kernel is working out the eraseSize incorrectly. I've hacked the openvix code and hardcoded the right value in the src code. Its working great now
Maybe this will help someone in the future...
Very big Respect i like you, but it's not just because you did it, it's because you don't gave up!
I know how it feels when you never did such H/W related things, after every little successes the next problem comes across.
I had big problem's and almost got crazy at a simpler thing, desoldering and reprogramming an EEPROM with a corrupt bootloader.. it was a total nightmare for me!
You have all rights to be proud on you
hahah yes. i didnt have the heart to throw away the box. Its not a new box, its not the latest box but I knew the faulty part was so cheap < 5 euro that it seemed crazy to throw the box away. Lots of learning, and lots of reading. Baby steps and a VERY BIG help on how to compile the Kernel in Linux from a helpful user on the openpli forum (
betacentauri) who show'd me how i compile just the kernel (in the openvix build environment). I hacked the source for myself. Not pretty but it works
The problem is that the linux kernel from vu that gets pulled down as part of the oe-alliance build has a file that determines how to use the nand. I inittially went about this wrong trying to fix the openvix distro to work with 512K pages, until recently I decided that was the wrong way, the right way was to fix the linux kernel to detect the chip right. I'm not skilled enough to fix the source code correctly so did a dirty hack in the source code, it works fine so thats all that matters.
Had to also learn how to remove and fit a TSOP48, also had to learn about using BBS3 to program CFE to the blank chip. If ANYONE needs help doing any of this, I am here and happy to help and answer all questions
IF anyone has the same box and the same problem, you need to replace the samsung nand with spansion S34ML01G100TFI000. It cost me £12.77 delivered for 7 units (i only needed 1 but they don't sell singles). This is from RS if you in are the UK, their part number is 8096961
I also had to buy a hot air rework station, but you can probably do this with Just a soldering iron, but I wouldn't advise it.
You also need a cypress FX2LP board to talk to the broadcom SOC to program the CFE on the blank. chip , this is £4.50 on ebay
"EZ-USBFX2LPCY7C68013A-56 USB2.0 Develope Board Module Logic Analyzer EEPROM"